Why did Trump want Zelenskyy to "do him a favor"?

[kentuck]

Trump made his infamous call to the new president on July 25, 2019. He wanted him to do a favor for him. He wanted the new president of Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

Strangely, Joe Biden was not the favorite to win the Democratic nomination at that time. In early February of 2020, he was almost dead in the water. By the first of March, after the SC primary, Joe Biden was the favorite to win the nomination. The African-American vote carried him to the eventual nomination.

But, when Trump made his call to Zelensky, Biden had never won even one primary in three races for the presidency? Why was Trump so concerned about Biden that he wanted the new president to find dirt on him?

Was Trump the one doing a favor for someone? Was it Vladimir Putin that did not want Joe Biden in the White House? Why?

The attempted extortion by Trump never made sense to me.

[Blue Owl]

1. Sounds like the Slobfather's mobby motives

[onecaliberal]

2. This is a good point and a good line of inquiry. Your theory is intriguing to me for the same

Reason you state. It doesn’t make sense, but in this context it certainly does.

[Walleye]

3. I'm sure Putin didn't want Biden in the White House. He knew him from way back

I think Trump knew what the rest of us knew was that Biden was the only one that could beat him. He started working on Zelenskyy right after Joe announced he was running

[FakeNoose]

4. My guess is that Chump was afraid that Biden might become his opponent in 2020

Of all the possible Democratic candidates, Biden was the one he feared most. Chump and Rudy wanted any dirt they could find on Hunter Biden, even if it wasn't real. They told Zelenskyy to make something up and give it them. Can you imagine? Rudy Giuliani is such a weasel.

The reason we know this is because Zelenskyy is no dummy, he knew a shakedown when he saw it. He called a press conference and told the world about the phone call, and Rudy's visit to him. He'd only been President of Ukraine for a little over a month.

[Hoyt]

5. By then, I think a lot of people -- including many here -- knew Biden had a real shot.

trump wanted to get Biden out, even if languishing at moment.

[BigmanPigman]

11. Yup, I thought Biden would be a good POTUS back in 2018.

[C Moon]

20. In the primary, I recall tfg saying he'd rather run against Biden than Sanders.

He was doing a childish lie to try to convince people that hated him to make the Democratic candidate Sanders.
Another of trump's terrible poker faces.

[elleng]

6. Dunno; somethings to think about 'again?' Oh GOOD.

The timeline of Trump’s decision to withhold aid to Ukraine is increasingly suspicious
Trump ordered the aid held just ahead of a call with Ukraine’s president.

By Sean Collins and Alex Ward Updated Sep 27, 2019, 11:47am EDT

President Donald Trump’s latest and greatest scandal centers on a key decision: his suspension of US military aid to Ukraine.

The Eastern European nation was expecting nearly $400 million in US support — including weapons, training, and advisers — to boost its effort to fight off Russia which invaded the country in 2014.

But by the time Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky got on the now infamous July 25 call with Trump, that aid had yet to be sent. It’s therefore no surprise Zelensky mentioned the assistance to Trump, to which Trump responded he’d like Zelensky to do him a “favor” in return: investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son.

It certainly seems like a quid pro quo was pretty clearly implied: You want your aid? Help me dig up dirt on my 2020 political rival.

Trump, however, continues to plead his innocence on Twitter by claiming nothing improper happened on the call. . .

Which means much of the current drama threatening Trump’s presidency comes down to this: Exactly why was the military aid held up in the first place?'>>>

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/9/24/20881505/donald-trump-withhold-aid-ukraine-timeline-whistleblower

[ancianita]

21. +1000

[Irish_Dem]

7. Maybe Trump was digging up dirt on all of his opponents.

This is the one we know about.

[ymetca]

8. Seems likely

he knew Obama's endorsement was coming, and all the rest now is history.

It was a pretty safe bet.

[DemocraticPatriot]

9. I think Trump rightly considered Joe Biden to be the biggest threat

to his re-election, among the Democratic candidates.

At the time he made his call, Biden did lead the national polls among Democrats. I do not find it so puzzling.

[wnylib]

22. True and I agree. I think Trump wanted

to run against Sanders because he thought he could win against someone who calls himself a Democratic Socialist. Trump wanted to emphasize the word socialist for fear mongering and to paint the entire Democratic Party as socialist to wreck down ticket votes along with the presidential candidate.

RWers, and many other people, see no difference between socialist and communist, or between socialist and Democratic Socialist.

So Trump believed that he could easily win against any of the female candidates with his misogynistic comments and patronizing (at best) attitude toward them. He would have attacked Buttigieg on sexuality. Sanders on socialism. But he needed something to use against Biden who is close to Trump's age, but healthier and better fit, plus more experienced and qualified. So he wanted dirt about Biden to be manufactured in case Biden became the nominee.

Trump still tried to use the socialism label on Biden, but it didn't work.

[BootinUp]

10. I was just listening to a podcast that brushed on this

the Al Franken podcast with Franklin Foer, and Mr. Foer talked about how Trump, intentionally or not, was inviting the Ukranian President to take the old corrupt route, the mafia like route.

[secondwind]

12. Trump knew he was going to lose. All his internals ndicated that

he was not going to win. He was desperate to stay in power because of all the investigations in NY Attorney General’s Office.

Trump knew he was going to lose. Hence, the “election is rigged” was born. And still lives on.

[SoCalDavidS]

14. All The Investigations In NY Atty General's Office

I could have saved him the effort, and told him that there was no chance anything would come of those “investigations.”

[Nevilledog]

13. He didn't even care if there was an actual investigation. He just wanted Zelensky to say it.

[John1956PA]

18. +1

He planned to capitalize on an announcement by Zelenski that there was going be an investigation into the (ridiculous) claim that a secret server had been secreted to Ukraine. He figured that such an announcement would deflect attention from the probes which were revealing that Russia had meddled in the 2016 campaign and was meddling in the 2020 campaign.

[Baked Potato]

15. Dump was scared of Joe Biden. Must have been internal polling. Nt

[NullTuples]

16. The last person Putin would want is Biden; he knew the playing field and the players

...and he would be able to rebuild at least some of what the GOP had dismantled of the US Federal government, simply by calling on those that worked in the Obama administration four years prior.

[Tickle]

28. I'm going with Putin

didn’t care who won. Either way he was going to destroy Ukraine and no one was going to stop him

[Demsrule86]

33. You are wrong. Putin did not want Biden...he knew it would make it more difficult.

[Scrivener7]

34. I agree with you because we are seeing that play out now. But tfg as President would have handed

Ukraine to him on a plate. Anyone else, he would have to fight for it.

So it would make sense to take out the most viable opponent to the easy path.

[Tickle]

36. A part of me

wants to say I wish we handed Ukraine to Putin maybe the dead would be alive and their infrastructure would be installed instead of demolished. Then they could fight in a peaceful way for their rights. Sounds silly I know but the death and destruction is hard to watch. The idea that no one is helping Ukraine just breaks my heart ♥️. I don’t know the right thing we could have done to stop it but here we are 😞

[Scrivener7]

37. No.

[FSogol]

39. So if I show up to destroy your house, you'll just give it to me?

All the death and destruction is being caused by Russia. Giving them Ukraine would not solve anything.

[Tickle]

41. yes I'll give you my house

if you don't kill my family.

If you really read what I typed before banging your head I had said it was a silly thing to say but the killing of ukrainians was devastating.

[ancianita]

17. The second impeachment proved why, remember?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_impeachment_trial_of_Donald_Trump

[SleeplessinSoCal]

23. So infuriating. But thanks for the reminder.

How is it possible the party of Lincoln is still with that traitor?

[ancianita]

25. How? It comes from lazy obedience & following, easier than thinking, reading and knowing.

Last edited Mon Mar 14, 2022, 09:40 AM - Edit history (1)

We tend to forget, but considering how long it took for Lincoln to do the right thing, I think they're accurately called the party of Lincoln. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/did-lincoln-racism-equality-oppose/

They're not necessarily with him, they just like the politics of sticking it to some designated scapegoat, believing their candle blows brighter when they blow out another's. Theirs is the politics of spite. That's exactly what Trump did to Democrats and government for four years, and what Putin does to Ukraine -- a war of spite.

Conflict driven people see offense where none is intended, easily get pointed to the "usual suspects," and conned into civil turmoil, and urged to see fellow Americans as a "danger," all the while being churchy, and believing in their own eternal innocence.

[SleeplessinSoCal]

26. The spite comes from hundreds of millions spent to propagandize them against us.

I recall in 2015 political discussions on Facebook that the Bannon folk were saying that Snopes was no longer reliable.

I strongly believe fixing the mess created by the misinformation age is essential to our survival as a democracy.

[Scrivener7]

35. This is a thing of beauty. It should be cut into sound bytes and posted everywhere.

[enki23]

19. It was the conspiracy theory that Ukraine helped rig the election for Hillary.

Yes, really.

[andym]

24. Why? Because in head to head matchups, the polls showed Joe beating Trump handily.

In the polling for who would pose the greatest problem for Trump, it was Joe. So Trump was afraid of Joe Biden, way before Biden became the Democratic frontrunner for the nomination.

[Straw Man]

27. Several people in this thread have nailed it.

It had nothing to do with Biden's chances of being the nominee; it had to do with Trump's chances of beating Biden if he (Biden) did manage to get the nomination. Trump knew he could scream "Lefty, lefty, lefty!" as a strategy against any of the other hopefuls, but there was much less chance of success with that strategy against a known-quantity centrist like JB.

[Emile]

29. Why? It's what a crime family boss does!

He was trying to manufacture dirt on one of his rivals.

[muriel_volestrangler]

30. President Biden was the clear leader in polls in July 2019

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationwide_opinion_polling_for_the_2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries#Polling_aggregation

February 2020 was his only dip.

[Demsrule86]

31. I think Biden was the candidate they feared all along. They knew he could and did win a general.

We could have had a contested primary and thankfully did not.

[Demsrule86]

32. And the only reason it was even close as President Biden had led for quite a while was because of

the first primary states do not reflect our diverse party at all and I want to see all that changed...no No more fucking caucuses, please! And Iowa should not go first nor should New Hampshire go as early. The states that are crucial for our win in the general should be going when the primary still matters too.

[Kid Berwyn]

38. Putin fears Biden

Otherwise, it don’t make no sense.

W looked in Putin’s soul. Biden knew he had none.

[lagomorph777]

40. Exactly. Why did Trump choose to pick on Ukraine?

Putin was pushing Trump to do it. Putin's intel found that Biden's son had a slight connection to Ukraine, so he used that as leverage to motivate Trump.

Ukraine is the entire reason that Putin installed Trump.

Ironically, choosing Hunter Biden as the supposed target of the cockamamie scheme probably elevated Joe Biden's status in the primaries. Oops.